P. & T. DEPARTMENT

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXIII, 30 June 1939, Page 9

P. & T. DEPARTMENT

RECRUITING AND TRAINING ! THE SERVICE AS A CAREER ADDRESS TO ROTARY CLUB An interesting talk was given to the Rotary Club yesterday by Mr C. L. Mayo, Chief Postmaster at Nelson, whose subject touched on aspects of the Department’s methods of recruiting, training, and what the Service has to offer as a career. “The main avenue of entry to-day, as in the past, is by appointment as a message boy,” said Mr Mayo. In this respect, the Department is different to all other branches of the Public Service because we must have young lads to deliver telegrams, and, if we are going to have a desirable type of lad, well, we must be able to provide them with avenues for progress. So the difference here between our Department and the rest of the Public Service is that while they can wait until a boy has matriculated or passed the Public Service Entrance examination, oui minimum educational requirement is a Standard VI Certificate or Proficiency, or, as it is called now, a Primary School Certificate.

The boy must be 14 years of age and not over 16 and while the Proficiency Certificate is the minimum requirement, if a boy with a higher educational qualification is available, he is—other things being equal—given preference. Once the boy has started, however, he is given every encouragement and facility to improve his educational qualifications. I might say that the Department is, generally speaking, comprised of two divisions. The first division or clerical division, as it used to be called, includes all clerical officers in gradas from a cadet right up to Chief Postmasters. The second consists of mes-sage-boys, postmen, mail messengers, switchboard attendants, linesmen, mechanicians, storemen, etc. While, of course, there are avenues of advancement in the second division to certain executive positions, such as Head Postman, Line Foreman, Overseer, Chief Mechanician, etc., the clerical side of the Department offers the most scope for a junior who is ambitious to attain one of the higher positions in the Service. THE MESSAGE BOY Reverting again to the message-boy. He is eligible for promotion to some of the higher positions in the second division without having to pass any examinations; but to enter the first division, he must pass the Public Service .Entrance Examination, University Entrance, or a departmental examination which is about the same standard as the Public Service Entrance. Of course, here again the boy that passes the higher examination gets preference, and if he gets his University Entrance, his promotion to the first division as a cadet follows almost automatically. In the larger towns there are technical schools for the boys to attend, and their duties are arranged, as far as practicable, to enable them to do so, but where there are no such facilities, arrangements can be made for them to

undertake a correspondence course provided by the Education Department. They are also given the opportunity of learning morse operating, and the Jad who becomes proficient there does not have to wait long for promotion. While, of course, the morse system of operating has been superseded by printing machines at the larger offices, the morse is still generally used at the smaller places, and, I should say, will be for some time to come. In any case, however, a lad has to become proficient as a land line morse operator before* he can be trained either in the machine-printing system or as a radio operator. At the present time, we have a morse learners’ school at Auckland and at Christchurch with a capacity for about 25 learners at each place. In addition, there is a machine-printing training school at Wellington where the most promising operators are sent for further training. Provided a lad has made some progress in operating by his own efforts —and they are selected for training according to their progress—it takes them three or four months to pass the test in morse operating, and then from four to five more to become proficient in the machine-printing system. There have been times in the past when sufficient officers have qualified in their own time to fill the vacancies occurring, but whenever there has been any rapid expansion of business, it has always been necessary to open one or more training schools in order to supplement the supply of operators.

After a boy gets his cadetship, he can go straight on in annual increments until he attains the highest salary payable to what is termed a rank and file man. To get beyond that, he has either to pass the University Entrance Examination or a substitute examination set by the Department. When he surmounts that hurdle—and the brightest of them do, of course—well, any position right up to that of Director-Gen-eral is open to them. EXECUTIVE CLASS When, of course, an officer gets into the executive class, the competition gets keener because, as far as humanly possible, promotion is given according to merit, and the Administration goes to no end of trouble to get a true and reliable estimate of each man’s ability and fitness for any particular position which becomes vacant. These promotions are not arranged by one man but by a Board consisting of five members, one of which is elected by ballot by the officers themselves. As a further protection, there is also a Board of Appeal where again the officers have an elected representative. To give you some idea of the extent to which officers continue their studies after joining the Department, we have, at the present time—ll Masters of Science, 42 Bachelors of Science, 1 Bachelor of Engineering, 1 Bachelor of Arts, 3 Bachelor of Commerce, 1 Master of Commerce, 41 Accountants’ Professional, some hundreds of matriculations. As, of course, in every other walk of life, an officer’s progress depends largely upon his own efforts, but there is no doubt that conditions have become more exacting as the business of the Department has increased. The scope of the Department’s activi-

ties has also increased enormously. When I look back on the days when there was no such thing as motor registration, radio licenses, social security. or air mails--just to mention a few of the more recent activities which have become attached to the post office —I feel that the Department must have been a home away from home. Of course, conditions of employment have improved vastly since then. I know that in my time the commencing salary was 10s a week, but as my home was in the country, I had to go into lodgings at a cost of 12s 6d a weeic, so there was not much for me to spend when my pay envelope came along. Today the lowest commencing salary for a lad is £52 per annum, and he goes to £65 after the completion of one year’s service. That may not appear a very great advance in 35 years, but the improvements in the intermediate grades have, I think, been greater in comparison.